Happy Fall!!

Well the leaves have turned here in Iowa, the cold rains are falling and... the jackets have been dusted off. Fall is certainly here.



Angie came with me a couple weeks ago and we found Benjamin a Dinosaur costume at the second hand store. Pretty dang cute for $6 I might say! It was between this and a devil costume... this suits him Much better I believe.



We have been having SO much fun with the little man! He is eating rice now-a-days.... and we sometimes put some jelly on our fingers, or syrup... he likes that sugary stuff... Can't say that I blame him. I don't think he's supposed to have it though - causes cavities, but... a tad bit on the finger tips can't hurt, right? And he doesn't have teeth to cause cavities in, anyway! Yeesh!

His giggle is probably the best thing in the world though. ...I think that people at war should just... stop fighting for a second and listen to Benjamin's laugh. Next thing you know they'll be laughing together too and maybe forget why they were even fighting in the first place. One day I was singing to benjamin... we sing to him a Lot, he LOVES it... and he was laughing So hard that the bottle he was trying to eat from kept popping out of his mouth. HA.



This poor kid, his parents are So weird.
We tried sitting him up in the pretty fall leaves on a sunny day (because who knows what Halloween weather will end up being like) but...




Well he's not very good Quite yet at sitting up. He'll sit for a few seconds but when the ground is sloping the wrong way he topples. Builds Character!

And that is how we are building our son's character!!

I am imagining that he will be a thrilling 3 year old to have conversations with...

And on the 8th day, there was DROOL

As a simple update: Jared's bike he has been working on is nearing completion... Patience, be patient.

We decided that since life has been so hectic that we would stay in this Saturday. And we did. I went to Starbucks with Paul and then to Bikeworld (not many saturdays are complete w/o a trip there...) then stayed home the rest of the day and worked on homework! I didn't even fark around or get distracted by ebay OR craigslist! Angie came over and even she got some homework done! Amazing!

The little man was in a really good mood for the morning, but we think his teeth were bugging him later on in the day... I wish I could describe with words the quantity of drool that falls from this guy's mouth - NIAGRA FALLS people.

This past week we had a little gathering of Brooke and Logan ...

Logan Really likes Ben! But holy buckets... two year olds are CRAZY. Logan is a GREAT kid, really great, but he is certainly an individual. I tip my hat to Brooke (and jordan) for doing school with a 2 year old. I mean... grad school is tough with Ben around... but its not like Ben is trying to open every cupboard in sight or reach for anything/everything on his level!! Our house is far from 2-year old proof. Alas, we do still Love having that kid over! hehe.

Also, and this may freak some people out... but... if ben is hanging on to something...like the couch... he can STAND THERE! his butt wobbles a bit as if he were dancing to some Ludacris playing in his head (he probably is...) but he'll stand there. After about a minute or so he'll decide to sit down, but if we help him back up he'll stand some more!

Wow he's growing fast.

Time to go play in the garage.

Busy Days

School has picked up to full-speed... our around-the-house projects have as well.

This is a frame project ...needs a bit more work but it is getting close - there is a pretty flower on the other side, growing out of the grass. Yaaay! ...and the Sun probably needs a smiley face. :)

On really busy mornings, jared eats things like this for breakfast:

It is better than him eating nothing I suppose!

If you haven't caught up on Ben's facebook album he is as cute as ever!!

We have story time together most nights - Luda ...well turns out he Loves reading stories, too...I mean that 70 pound guy is more on my lap than Benjamin is. What a cuddle bug.

And this is a little bit what our Sunday afternoons look like. Jared and Ben napped together for TWO full hours today. poor kids - all kinds of tired.

Someone asked me about a month ago "what is the thing about parenting that you Least expected?" I think I answered it with something... just off the top of my head like "uuuh oh geez... how much POOP there is..." But I think ...after mulling it over, I would change my answer to being "how instinctive it all is." There are a few half-hours/hours here and there where Jared and I look at one another going "what do we DO!??!?" but we figure it out and move on. Waking up at 3am became cake. Benjamin goes to bed now at 9pm and sleeps until 6-7am... Some nights getting him to sleep can be a little bit of a struggle, but he cries it out and is done in 10-15 minutes and we didn't read that anywhere, we never really even asked someone about it - it just Seemed like it might work - and it did/does....like a man on a schedule, he starts getting a Tad fussy at 8:45 and is asleep by 9...and he can't even read a clock yet!

Knowing what he is crying about is also something that ...is surprisingly easy to dissect. It is most noticeable when we are around other people watching him. As soon as he cries, many people assume/first ask "oh, is he hungry" ...he May be, but it is sometimes that he would rather stand up than be held laying down, he would rather face away from you to look around rather than... just look at you; he just wants his little Lion thinger to slobber on.

....

I think the favorite thing for both of us to do... is to get him to smile.

Jared's turn to post.

Tomorrow/today... everyone and I mean Everyone should call Jared via his cell phone and tell him that it is his turn to do a blog post.

If you need his number and only have mine, send me a text message.

kim